Her heart hammered inside her chest as clammy hands gripped the rail. Suzaron had never seen her homelands before and now there on the horizon she could see Norway in the distance. She knew no one from there but knew that her mother's dowry lay somewhere to the East of the main capitol. 'Tis my dowry now, I suppose. she thought sadly. She had no idea what even to expect when she got there, but Lord Pendrick... father had assured her that if anything happened to him that there were those who would be awaiting her arrival.

She pressed her lips into an ever grim expression. Up until last year, she had only known Lord Pendrick as the lord of some unknown wandering trade and as her master. Her mother had been a highborn lady in their homelands that had been captured and sold into the life of slavery. Lord Pendrick had bought her and to the best of Suzaron's knowledge kept her mother as a scullery maid, always one the move with him and his entourage. While the lord, himself had always been kind, many of his higher class staff had not been, so Suzaron and her mother often were treated far more as slaves than the man had known, nor would have cared for.

When her mother passed away of illness, Lord Pendrick had called for Suzaron right away and revealed himself as her father, explaining somewhat shyly about the tryst they shared and how the nobles he dealt with would have looked down on him for it. He apologized whole-heartedly for the terrible way in which matters were handled and the way they had been treated. The rest of the time he spent teaching what he knew of trade and combat so that she could aid him in his rather questionable trading practices. While slavery, as it turned out, was something he was very much against, there were plenty of other substances which he seemed to have no qualms about smuggling over borders.

Perhaps it was for this reason that Lord Pendrick had indeed had something happen to him. One night their camp was beset by what seemed to be bandits, however instead of stealing any goods, only a couple of guards were killed and her father taken. No ransom was left and no demands made. Davos Delkinson, a young man not much older than her, was the one to give commands to the rest in camp to gather up and in the end convinced her that they should turn away and head for Norway as her father had wished. Davos was a loyal retainer whose snarky attitude and kind gestures made him somewhat difficult to read, though over the past month since her father's abduction, the young man most often came across as an older brother, despite his protests of sharing any such lineage.

The corners of her mouth twitched slightly as if she might almost smile at the thought of Davos being her brother. Even if he were not, it still gave her a bit of peace to think there might be some semblance of family to help her until she could grow strong enough, and gain enough intell to go about rescuing her father. Suzaron never had decided fully if she forgave Lord Pendrick or not for all that her life and that of her mother's had turned out to be but she knew that his regrets were real and that, at least was a start.

Nearly a year had passed since Suzaron's feet had touched homeland oil and she had taken the tour of her mother's estates. While there was not nearly as much to the place as she had always imagined, it was still a far cry more than she had been used to and for now, at least all that training in sales and trades, both of common and less savory practices, seemed to be all but useless. What was not useless was her training in combat, which has been almost exclusively only with Davos since she entered Thorinar. She had scarcely had time to get settled in when a letter from the Konungr had arrived, requesting her to come to the capitol.

It seemed His Majesty was eager to get her official titles dubbed unto her right away and get her inducted into a more steady training regimen. Here she learned how best to manage her fiefdom and the shire. A near fumble of finances on her part had once caused the over all pay to the other Hersirs and Riddari to suffer a shortage in pay for a couple of days. Everyone, while perhaps disgruntled, all were kind and understanding of her mistake, simply muttering something about her youth. She wondered if others had fouled up like that before. Davos and a few of her newly acquired retainers gave her guff about it in their free time, but only because they knew she must learn to take such ribbing in stride if she were to deal with the public more often.

She w as unsure why all of the Riddari and Hersirs trained in combat regularly,though she did not doubt that the Konungr had something grand in mind for them at some point. In the meantime she took special note that Poland seemed to be moving forces around a bit as well.

She often checked for new reports of her father as well.There had been no new sightings in quite some time and she was beginning to fear that her vows to rescue him had become but empty words. Perhaps the merchants he had been dealing with had exacted some revenge for a deal gone wrong? Perhaps her had never survived the initial attack. She felt she would never know. She was ready to give up when a strange letter came in the mail. It was addressed to her, but held no written words. scribbled across the parchment were coordinates for somewhere in Saxony, a half pressed seal of a tiny dragon curled around a quill, and a few splatters of what looked to be blood and tears. Her first reaction was to wad the parchment into a ball clutching it close to her chest and the next was to demand that Davos arrange for her to travel to Saxony alone when only her loyal retainers.

Said retainers, Macavoy and Tresta, protested loudly, but could not talk any sense into the young Hersir. Suzaron was blinded with fury and passion for saving her only blood kin. In the end, it was Davos who, stepping outside of his role as her mentor, and more so into the role of brother-she-never-had, flat out forbade her to leave Telemark. He reminded her of her fiefdom and her Oath to the shire that the king had granted her. He reminded her that of all things, her safety for the sake of those under her, was paramount, especially since she had no living heirs yet. Davos scolded her that it was as much a duty of hers, to bear children as it was to fight in the kingdom's ranks or to settle squabbles among the people of Akershus Prio. She could have struck the man for speaking so boldly to her, but some part of her knew that he was right. Defeated, she promised those most loyal to her that she would remain in Telemark and continue her training. Satisfied, Davos then made arrangements for her to meet with a couple of the Riddari from neighboring shires.

She did not bother to mention to Davos or her retainers, however, that she had sent a letter to the king of Saxony, requesting any information regarding her father and those most likely to have taken him. Likewise, Davos had not told her that she had sent requests to influential gentleman between the ages of 15 and 20, many of them kings, themselves, inviting them to meet with Suzaron to assess whether she was worthy as a potential marriage candidate, as well.

I got to excuse my late reply, but you adressed your letter to our King Alrik III and sent it to saxon castle. So it had to be deliverd first to Paris where our King takes part in several turneys. Since I am responsible for foreign affairs it was returned to saxon castle to my department. Unfortunatly no one shares its informations on inhabitants, merchants or travellers. So I overhanded your request to the minister of inner affairs who granted the result of his research to me a couple of weeks ago, I will quote:

"A person named Lord Pendrick is unknown to us."

Since my duty demands to establish and keep good relations to representatives of foreign Nations I immediatly insisted to restart research with higher effort. I am glad to inform you that we found a person called Pendrick rent a place on the marketplace of Magdeburg in June 1148 and it seems he rested in a tavern close to the Stiftskirche in Quedlinburg for a couple of weeks in march 1147.

I have asked the minister of inner affairs to take care of the name Lord Pendrick. If you be so kind to tell me why you are looking for him? In case he is a criminal we would be very glad to support you in your manhunt.